These Crazy Animal Attractions from the Past Would Never Fly Today

Dancing bears at circuses used to be the status quo. These extreme animal acts are now banned, and we're thrilled.

Seeing an elephant balance on a ball at the circus used to seem like old fashioned family fun. Why any of us thought it was safe or easy to train an elephant to perform such a feat is a mystery. People have been using live animals for entertainment for centuries, yet animal welfare wasn’t considered until fairly recently. As of 2023, only eight states have banned or restricted the use of animals in traveling circuses.

Nevertheless, the acts performed today are far more tame than the animal attractions of decades past. Of all the crazy animal attractions on record, these are by far the most bizarre.

Bear Wrestling

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Bear wrestling used to be a popular sport. It was a common animal attraction in the early 1900s. As if bears wrestling other bears isn’t a bad enough idea, bear wrestling actually entailed bears wrestling humans. Typically, the bears wrestled their own trainer in a choreographed match. Sometimes, the bear would play the winner, others, they’d pretend to dramatically lose to their victorious owner. The fact that a bear is a wild animal and should never be owned at all wasn’t even a consideration.

Occasionally, the circus would invite members of the audience to wrestle the bear, with a cash prize if they won. At first glance, the act doesn’t seem that inhumane, but the only reason no one was seriously harmed was because wrestling bears had their claws and teeth surgically removed.

Bears on Ice

Anefo / Wikimedia Commons

If bear wrestling seems bad, keep in mind it was far from the only bizarre act bears got roped into. Circus bears were routinely humiliated, forced to wear silly costumes, ride bikes and participate in a number of other sickly comical acts.

One of the oddest was bear ice skating, a practice that persisted well into the 2000s. Bears were forced to wear ice skates and parade around awkwardly on ice. In 2009, one bear skated straight over to one of the circus administrators to bring the performance, and the man’s life, to a rapid, dramatic close. Ice skating is supposed to be dramatic, but not that dramatic. Let’s keep the risks of a festive holiday trip to the rink to minor concussions, not lethal maulings.

The best part? The CNN report on the incident stated, “It is unclear what caused the bear to attack.” Really? Anyone want to share an educated guess?

Geek Shows

Antique photo: Circus performers acrobats

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Just to cover all our bases, the terms used for circus performers during the early 20th century weren’t politically correct whatsoever. “Geeks” were a type of circus “freak” who had one particular talent, if you can even call it that: Biting the heads off of live animals and drinking its blood.

The animals used were usually chickens or snakes. The idea of a geek show was to scare people into thinking they, too, might turn into “freaks,” because the geeks were otherwise completely normal. Male geeks were much more common since women were more hesitant to perform such a violent act. We can’t imagine why. Geeks also were prone to contracting illnesses like salmonella due to their constant exposure, and breaking teeth or jaws was a common occurrence.

Octopus Wrestling

Pais / Wikimedia Commons

We thought bear wrestling was bad, but if we go back to Washington State’s Puget Sound during the ’50s and ’60s, it gets even weirder. There, divers took place in serious octopus wrestling competitions. There was even a World Octopus Wrestling Championship in 1963. 111 divers participated, catching octopuses and dragging them to the surface. They were awarded points for the amount of equipment used and the weight of the octopus they wrestled.

Calling the practice “wrestling” was a stretch. Octopuses live in secluded ocean caves and would prefer to avoid confrontation. Wrestling one equated to grabbing the poor creature by the head and pulling on it until it released the rock it was suctioned to. Why did anyone think that was okay? It’s even worse now that we know how intelligent octopuses are.

Horse Diving Competitions

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“Wow, that horse was born to jump off an Olympic diving board,” said no one ever. No one except William “Doc” Carver. He launched the unethical animal attraction after a bridge gave out while he was riding his horse. The horse fell into the water unharmed, so why not try it again on purpose?

The attraction was most popular in the 1880s, but it stuck around until it faced backlash from animal welfare activists following World War II. We’re glad they spoke up, because the horses were forced to dive several times a day, every day of the week. Trainers often used electric shocks or hidden trapdoors to force them to jump. Some of the diving platforms were as high as 60 feet.

Ferret-Legging

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Ferret-legging is probably the most benign and silly of all the odd animal attractions from the past. It sounds like leggings were from ferret fur, but no. Ferret-legging involved shoving a live ferret down the participants’ pants. Strangely, the game was popular through the 1970s. The rules were:

1. Pants had to be large enough to allow the ferret to move around freely.

2. Pants were tied at the ankle so the ferret couldn’t run away.

3. No underwear allowed.

4. The ferret must have fully functional claws and teeth.

Multiple people would participate at once, and whoever could stand the experience the longest won. Honestly, ferrets, do your worst. The people participating deserved every awkwardly-placed bite and scratch they got.

Goat Throwing

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Once again, what is wrong with people? Goat throwing started in the Spanish village of Manganeses de la Polvorosa. There was a local legend that a priest once had a magical goat that produced so much milk, it could feed the entire village. The goat climbed to the top of a church tower, and then was so startled by the bells ringing for Sunday mass that it plummeted down to the streets below. Instead of perishing, it lucked out and was caught by passersby with a blanket.

Ever since, the townspeople carried on a twisted tradition to honor Saint Vincent, the city’s patron saint: Hauling a live goat to the top of a 50-foot church tower and chucking it off. The crowd below would catch the goat in a canvas sheet. When animal rights activists brought the practice to a halt, the town mayor claimed having a patron saint celebration without goat throwing was like celebrating Christmas without a tree. If it were up to us, he’d be thrown off the roof instead.

Thankfully, the town has since adapted the tradition and now uses a plastic goat.

Dead Whale Exhibits

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From the ’50s through the ’70s, people were into disturbingly dark animal attractions. One particularly popular exhibit? The exploration of a dead whale. Three whales named Jonah, Hercules and Goliath were caught off the coast of Norway. They were originally used to promote the whaling industry, but ambitious showmen saw an opportunity: Preserve them, take out their insides, deck them out in lights and display them at outdoor event centers.

People were invited to see the giant animals up close for a fee. The exhibits usually lined up harpoons and similar whaling instruments to add to the horror.

Lion Drome

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Circular racetracks called motordromes were extremely popular for wild motorbike shows in the 1930s. They were shaped like bowls, allowing bikers to work up enough speed to ride along the walls nearly perpendicularly to the track. As if motorbike stunts like that weren’t risky enough, someone decided to add live lions to the mix.

Custom-made sidecars were added to motorcycles just for “pet” lions to ride in. The animals joined their owners on the track going 80 miles per hour along a wall cheerfully nicknamed “The Wall of Death.” Somehow, that wasn’t thrilling enough to please the audience. Lions were later let loose in the motordrome and trained to chase the motorcycles and swipe at them. Lion dromes remained a thing until an incident in 1964. An intoxicated circus worker shoved his hand into a lion cage. His hand was rapidly amputated by the teeth of a lion named King. Thanks for your service, King. Lions everywhere can breathe a sigh of relief.

Orca Shows

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Orca shows have been one of the last unethical wild animal attractions to fizzle out. Orca shows first came under scrutiny in 1991 when three orcas killed trainer Keltie Lee Byrne. She fell into the whale pool and a whale named Tilikum dragged her under until she drowned.

If that seemed like a fluke, the 12,500-pound whale also drowned a trespassing 27-year-old man named Daniel Dukes. He climbed into the pool after hours and drowned, but his body was found mutilated. Then, in 2010, SeaWorld trainer Dawn Brancheau was killed after a show. Tilikum latched onto her ponytail and dragged her into the water. In addition to drowning, she suffered severe blunt force trauma. Shockingly, Tilikum went back to performing again shortly after.

Animal activists reasonably claim that Tilikum only became violent and unpredictable due to the stress and boredom of being held in captivity. There have been zero recorded orca-related fatalities in the wild, compared to four in captivity. Capture of a wild orca hasn’t occurred in the US since 1976, but some states still permit captive-bred orca acts. California, however, passed the California Orca Protection Act in 2016 banning the captivity of orcas and their use for entertainment and performance purposes.